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Creating a Celebration Culture

When’s the last time you heard someone say, “The problem with working here is I’m just appreciated way too much?” Healthy cultures have appreciation and celebration as their cultural backbone. They create an environment in which everyone oohs and aahs over each other’s successes and contributions.

Notice I said EVERYONE, not just managers. You might convince yourself that the manager who high-fives the top salespeople is just doing his or her job. But once you get celebration and congratulation flowing from peer to peer, you know you’ve created a celebration culture.

So how do you get there? By creating rituals of celebration.

At the core of every healthy and fully functioning family are rituals—those things the children remember as the consistent events where they felt loved and appreciated. Think back to the happiest memories of your own childhood. The odds are good that you’re remembering some sort of family ritual—something that was done over and over to create the texture of your family life.

Companies are just the same. Your rituals of celebration must be daily, weekly, and quarterly. Maybe you have a daily huddle before opening where each person briefly shares an accomplishment while the rest of the team cheers and claps. Maybe you have a positive sharing at the beginning of each weekly strategy meeting and a quarterly ceremony filled with many awards and recognitions.

Don’t worry about making it all grown-up. In fact, do the opposite. If you create a childlike energy of people high-fiving with joy, you can expect people to thrive under the recognition. If you have a stale meeting where you give an “Employee of the Month” award – a ridiculous award that breaks every principle of motivation – and follow it with a boring speech or a PowerPoint presentation, you may as well forget doing your quarterly meetings.

Instead, get happy, get goofy, and let the love and appreciation flow from one person to another. That’s a rising tide that will lift all boats and surge your company forward.